Initial Results from the MAJORANA DEMONSTRATOR

Abstract

Neutrinoless double-beta decay searches seek to determine the nature of neutrinos, the existence of a lepton violating process, and the effective Majorana neutrino mass. The {\sc Majorana} Collaboration is assembling an array of high purity Ge detectors to search for neutrinoless double-beta decay in ${}^{76}$Ge. The {\sc Majorana Demonstrator} is composed of 44.8~kg (29.7 kg enriched in ${}^{76}$Ge) of Ge detectors in total, split between two modules contained in a low background shield at the Sanford Underground Research Facility in Lead, South Dakota. The initial goals of the {\sc Demonstrator} are to establish the required background and scalability of a Ge-based, next-generation, tonne-scale experiment. Following a commissioning run that began in 2015, the first detector module started physics data production in early 2016. We will discuss initial results of the Module 1 commissioning and first physics run, as well as the status and potential physics reach of the full {\sc Majorana Demonstrator} experiment. The collaboration plans to complete the assembly of the second detector module by mid-2016 to begin full data production with the entire array.

arXiv commentNeutrino 2016 proceeding

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Cited by in corpus (20)

• Search for Zero-Neutrino Double Beta Decay in 76Ge with the Majorana Demonstrator
• A renormalized approach to neutrinoless double-beta decay
• Neutrinoless double beta decay in chiral effective field theory: lepton number violation at dimension seven
• Neutrinoless double beta decay matrix elements in light nuclei
• Sterile neutrinos and neutrinoless double beta decay in effective field theory
• Heavy physics contributions to neutrinoless double beta decay from QCD
• Neutrinoless double beta decay in effective field theory: the light Majorana neutrino exchange mechanism
• Neutrinoless Double-Electron Capture
• Neutrinoless double beta decay and chiral $SU(3)$
• Towards Precise and Accurate Calculations of Neutrinoless Double-Beta Decay: Project Scoping Workshop Report
• Long-distance Contributions to Neutrinoless Double Beta Decay ${\pi }^{-}\to {\pi }^{+}ee$
• Light-Neutrino Exchange and Long-Distance Contributions to $0\nu 2\beta$ Decays: An Exploratory Study on $\pi \pi \to ee$
• Comparison between Variational Monte Carlo and Shell Model Calculations of Neutrinoless Double Beta Decay Matrix Elements in Light Nuclei
• Fabrication and Characterization of High-Purity Germanium Detectors with Amorphous Germanium Contacts
• Study on cosmogenic activation in germanium detectors for future tonne-scale CDEX experiment
• Hiding neutrinoless double beta decay in the minimal seesaw mechanism
• Present Status of Nuclear Shell-Model Calculations of Neutrinoless Double-Beta Decay Matrix Elements
• Solar Axion Search Technique with Correlated Signals from Multiple Detectors
• Alpha-event and surface characterisation in segmented true-coaxial HPGe detectors
• Recent Results from the Majorana Demonstrator